Pain & Polio

Admitting that they are no closer to finding a cure for polio, a team of Brooklyn doctors last week reported notable success with a treatment which relieves the pain and helps get patients out of the hospital sooner. The drug they use is Priscoline (which expands blood vessels and speeds up circulation). Dr. Emil Smith and five colleagues tested it last year on 663 patients at the Kingston Avenue Hospital.

In the early stages of polio, the doctors pointed out in the Journal of the American Medical Association, victims often complain of pain which keeps them rest less, fretful and unable to sleep well.

Many others have a less obvious tenderness in muscles or arteries, which flares up as acute pain when they are handled by nurses. Still others have severe muscle spasm.

Most of the patients began to feel better within half an hour after getting Priscoline, the six doctors reported. They "experienced a sense of well-being and sighed with relief. The pain either diminished or disappeared completely . . . They rested more comfortably during the day.

Their appetite improved, and they enjoyed their food. The majority stated that they were able to sleep comfortably for the first time since the illness began.

Muscle twitchings present in some of the patients receded." There was no evidence that the drug affected the polio virus in any way. But perhaps because the patients' resistance was not sapped so quickly by pain and loss of sleep, the acute phase of the illness appeared to be shortened.

Most of Dr. Smith's patients were able to leave the hospital after only seven to 14 days, some to go home, others to an orthopedic hospital where the retraining of impaired muscles could begin sooner. Dr. Smith does not recommend giving the drug to patients who have the severe forms of bulbar or bulbospinal poliomyelitis, or to those in iron lungs.

The doctors also reported an indirect benefit. Moist hot packs have been the standard treatment for polio pain. Besides being messy, packs keep the nurses overworked. With the drug, nurses can spend more time on other ways of making their patients more comfortable.

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